something like destiny
by Seven Silver Stars
Summary: On those who run away, those who fight for them in the end and those who would die for someone else. -k/s, love, cursing, and other such things-


A/N: I love these characters lots. I hope you do too. Also, I love reviews and hope you do too.

Disclaimer: I don't own 'em.

* * *

Jim is fifteen the first time he runs away. Really runs away, that is.

He's had a few false starts where he's started driving and had a bout of guilt halfway out of town. This time, though, he actually does it. Actually gets out onto the highway and just drives and drives and drives.

It isn't because of his stepfather this time. Well, mostly not because of him. Mostly it's because he's just gotten so tired of the look his mother gets in her eyes when she looks at him. This only happens on the rare occasions she's on-planet; that look of disappointment mixed with pity mixed with something he doesn't want to give a name to.

He fails all his tests on purpose and doesn't clean up his shit and lies all the time just to see how people will react and without fail, they hate him. Everyone fucking hates him. Even when he was getting good marks and being honest they hated him. Then it was for being better and now for being worse. He's just George Kirk's rebel kid, he can't ever live up to anyone's expectations.

He can't win, so he runs away from it all. Takes his phone, some money and his bike and that's about it. Just leaves. Doesn't tell anyone.

It's great for a couple days- he stays at whatever cheap motel he gets to and leaves in the morning, maybe snagging an energy drink or two from the fridge.

He sort of knows it isn't going to last; he's going to run out of money or the police are going to recognize him. That's the thing about being the son of a hero- people more or less know you on sight.

Eventually the police do track him down- he's only fifteen after all and his mother has been calling him frantically and leaving increasingly angry messages about sending the authorities after him. She does send them and they take him and his bike back. He goes without protest, but with a resigned, tired smile.

* * *

He goes on hating the place.

* * *

The second time he runs away is almost a full three years later. They want him to go to college, be a genius, go places. He hates all their fucking assumptions.

This time Jim is pretty sure he isn't coming back. He doesn't go all that far, just a state over, but he isn't going back. He's of age now and isn't going to be tracked down by the police and so he rents a flat and stays there. Gets a job as a waiter at some nice restaurant during the day and spends his nights getting shitfaced.

It's a pretty good life, he thinks, all things considered. There's nobody around with any ridiculous _expectations_ of him. That was his real problem in the first place; his mom wanted him to be perfect, he wasn't. He didn't want to be. She wasn't perfect enough to have stopped his stepfather from hitting him, why should he be perfect for her?

This kind of life is nice. He isn't living in a house that suffocates him anymore, and if he isn't exactly happy, well, at least he doesn't want to kill everything around him nowadays. Usually.

* * *

Then this asshole Pike guy comes along and everything changes. He wants to be better, if only to prove to those Starfleet jerks that he can be. He doesn't hate the world enough to get drunk every day now and even makes friends with the doctor who is the only other person on the cadet shuttle not dressed in uniform.

The guy tolerates him, is even a good friend. Jim hasn't had many of those. He's had a lot of one-night stands and failed relationships but not really many good friends. Bones gets it, though. He's got his own sort of brokenness, the kind that stems from having lost so much and not really knowing how to fix it.

They understand one another.

* * *

Jim doesn't call his mother a single time.

* * *

Then Spock comes along. Jim doesn't really know what to think about him. Talk about a bad first impression- now he has to work with him? To save the world from a psychopath? Sounds impossible. Implausible at the very least.

Then Vulcan is consumed and Spock wanders around looking forlorn for a while and then orders Jim off his ship.

Jim gets it. Spock is broken and is taking it out on him by sending him to Planet Fucking Nowhere.

It still pisses him off.

Shit really gets weird when he meets older-Spock in a cave and the old guy tells him that there's some sort of Great Destiny that awaits him. Jim's never been a big believer in fate.

He does get back to the ship and the plan goes smoothly and he wonders a bit about the destiny thing, but chooses to ignore it for now.

* * *

He decides to worry about destiny only when he has to.

* * *

Jim isn't an idiot, though, despite what some people might think. He sees the way Spock tenses up even now when his parents are mentioned.

Jim thinks Spock is also one of those boys who ran away when he was a kid. At the same time, he isn't sure about that because Spock is too proper for anyone to think he was a rebellious child. It seems like that, though- Jim does look through his records and find Spock's rejection of the Vulcan Science Academy.

It's… fascinating, to coin a phrase.

So he asks whether Spock has run away. He figures they've already got a strong enough friendship that the answer won't affect it that much. Also, he is interested in the answer.

Spock stiffens at the question, deliberating a few moments. "Yes, Jim," he eventually answers. "For a few days. My father was quite furious when I returned."

Jim doesn't quite know what to make of this information. What? When? he wants to ask, but doesn't get up the nerve. That's too private, even for him. He doesn't want to touch a nerve and ruin this semi-stable thing they have built for the sake of his own curiosity. He likes it far too much.

* * *

Of course, Jim should have known life couldn't be this great for long. He loves his ship and these people and wants it to last. He thinks he might even love Spock. He isn't_ in_ love, he thinks, but he does love the Vulcan just for being his first officer who will always be logical and point out his faults and who would give his life for another as fast as Jim would.

There are few people better than those willing to give everything for someone else, in Jim's book at least.

In the space of a few months, Spock has become a friend and the person he trusts most about… well, everything, really.

* * *

Okay, so maybe he_ is _a little in love with Spock.

* * *

Naturally, everything goes to hell when Uhura tells him that his mother is coming aboard to discuss shipping procedures for some product or other. And he had hoped so much that such issues wouldn't come up- but everything seems to constantly be going to hell around Jim Kirk so he isn't particularly surprised. He supposes they'll manage.

Dinner with his mother in the Captain's quarters as things are being moved from one ship to the other is bound to be an extremely awkward affair, so Jim invites Spock along, praying that this will save him at least some grief. His mother hasn't seen him in four years and there is probably a screaming match in his near future, but maybe Spock's presence can defuse some of her anger. His logic has a tendency to disconcert those silly passionate humans.

Spock must see something written on Jim's features because he agrees with no fuss and takes the turbolift with Jim after their shift is over. Kirk's mother is due at his quarters in half an hour.

Outwardly, Kirk is beaming at Spock, still glad that he decided to accept the request. Inwardly, there is an incessant refrain of "oh shit" in his head. In fact, he's really having a hard time not repeating it out loud as well.

They sit down at the table and make small conversation, the impending doom hanging in the air practically stifling them. Spock must feel it too, as he keeps giving concerned little eyebrow-twitches that would be extremely hard to notice if Jim wasn't an adept reader of Vulcan facial expressions by now. That's probably a bad sign, Jim thinks vaguely. Maybe he should start considering that whole destiny thing.

Jim's mother arrives. She sits down, looking like she finds the situation as awkward as Jim does. Clearly, her one solution to this is to talk about ship's business.

This does not work for long; there is nothing interesting going on.

"Why did you do it, Jim? You ran away as soon as you could! I haven't seen you in four years. Why?"

"I had to. Look, Mom, it wasn't because of you-"

"Then why? I never did anything bad by you, I tried to raise you right-"

"You were never _there _to raise me right! You left me alone in that godforsaken house most of the time and still expected me to be perfect at everything!" Jim lashes out, anger bubbling up. "Now you're going to try and own me again? Thanks, but no thanks."

"James, that is quite enough. I'm your mother! I've always just wanted what's best for you," Winona says, practically pleading.

"You stopped being my mother when your husband slapped me in front of you and you didn't do anything. Sorry, _Mom_," Jim sneers.

Winona's hands clench into fists. Spock hasn't spoken a single word since the argument began, watching them both warily. Jim doesn't know why he expected anything from the Vulcan anyway- he was unlikely to intervene in the conflict of two stupid humans. It would have been nice, though.

"Fine. I wasn't 'doing anything' when I reported him to the police. I see, Jim. I guess it was all my fault and not yours, _never _yours, even though you didn't give a shit about anything then. Still don't, it looks like," she says tightly. "Why care about other people when you can just use them for yourself?"

Jim feels five again. All these years and his mother is still the one person who can make him want to curl up and cry for a week with just a few well-placed words.

"Excuse me. I believe it would be beneficial to both of you if you were to leave now, Mrs. Kirk," Spock interjects, staring dispassionately at Winona. He gets up and even slightly hustles her out the door. She leaves and Spock comes back in.

Jim immediately attacks, still angry. "I don't need you to fight my battles for me, Spock," he says and it's like they've returned to that first awful day on the ship when neither of them knew what to do around the other.

But then Spock says, "I know. However, I wished to. It was not because I believed you needed my help."

Jim forgives him. How can he not? It's Spock.

"Well. Thanks, then."

* * *

In the end, everything really doesn't go to hell.

* * *

After Spock and he have almost died for the umpteenth time during the five-year mission, Jim loudly professes his love while high on whatever Bones has given him to kill the pain.

In theory, it would have been wiser to wait until he wasn't doped up and they hadn't just almost died and he knew what the hell he was saying, but for some reason it felt like he couldn't wait. Besides, they were constantly almost-dying these days, and Jim didn't want to face not getting the chance to tell him at all.

Spock, who was not hurt nearly as much- fucking Vulcan superstrength, Kirk thinks without venom- merely raises an eyebrow, sitting in the chair by Jim's bed.

"Jim, I am not now sure if you have noticed, but my hands have come into contact with your skin before. Vulcans, as I believed you knew, are touch-telepaths. This means I was well aware of your… feelings for several months," Spock finishes, wincing ever-so-slightly at the word 'feelings.'

"Oh," Jim says. The idea of Spock already knowing rolls around in his head a while before getting to his brain. Then the words come out before he can stop them. "So… you're okay with it?"

It looks like Spock has trouble refraining from rolling his eyes. Jim would most likely find this a lot more amusing if he wasn't so out of it.

"You," he murmurs, "are an extremely illogical human who I occasionally suspect of being deliberately obtuse. However, I find that I do not particularly care."

Then he bends down and kisses Jim. Focus clicks into Jim's fuzzy mind, bringing with it a billion colors and lights and an eternity of _this, just this_ and _Spock, just Spock_.

They're both broken people in some ways, both the kids that ran away in search of something different, Jim thinks later. Then he grins and knows that they'll be able to fix each other anyway.

Maybe there's something to that destiny business after all.


End file.
